Acosta reviews Edur reviews Lopatkina reviews

Having watched ballet (but-unfortunately-mainly on tv and video) for too many years, I believed that no male variation could get me ecstatic any more. But then I hadn't seen Carlos Acosta. So there he was yesterday night dancing in the Gala des Etoiles here in Thessaloniki, Greece the Diana & Actaeon pdd (with Tiekka Schofield) and the DQ pdd with Jennifer Gelfand from the Boston Ballet (by the way, she was no just unmusical; she danced -both the DQ and the Flames of Paris pdd with Jose Carreno- completely regardless of the music.). Everything about him was spectacular. How lucky you are!

What's best this was not the hit of the night. Because Uliana Lopatkina danced the White Swan pdd with Igor Zelensky. Two years ago in the Gala des Etoiles she had danced the same pdd (with Uvarov). She was exquisite, but that performance (as much as I remember it) had nothing to do with yesterday night's magic. In the second part she danced also a modern tango.

And then there were also Agnes Oaks and Thomas Edur dancing Derek Deane's Impromptu (beautiful) and Diana Vishneva, who did the Tchaikovsky pdd with Zelensky. And Jose Manuel Carreno. And others.

I am going to see the same program (except that Uliana will do the Dyig Swan) tonight and tomorrow night. After two years of starvation it's a bliss.

Later Christina posted for us all again...

The gala was performed in an open-air amphitheatre high in the castles of the town. Although it's a modern concrete construction, the trees just behind the scene, the lights of the town below and then the sea create a marvelous site (I will never forget Baryshnikov two years ago moving slowly in front of the two big cypress trees).

This gala (produced by Victor Melnikov from Canada, with Frank Augustyn as artistic director) comes in Greece for the third year now. Unfortunately last year the show (with Maya Plissetskaya and Darcey Bussell as well) was only in Athens, and I couldn't go. But the year before we had here Asylmuratova with Zaklinski, Paloma Herrera, Jose Carreno, Uliana Lopatkina, Nadezhda Gracheva, Wendy Whelan - Jock Soto from NYCB, Evelyn Hart and Andrei Uvarov among others.

Two days ago, even with Lopatkina and Acosta dancing, I thought that I would have exchanged everything for Asylmuratova. But yesterday Uliana did the Dying Swan. All these years I have seen (both in live performances and on video) many a Russian divas doing this dance - and I was always bored. All those strong movements, all those flowing arms and the russian histrionics and exhibitionism were disturbing. The only dancers that I loved in this dance were Anna Pavlova, Maya Plissetskaya and two years ago Lopatkina. Last night, when I saw Lopatkina doing the same dance once more I forgot everything about any other ballerina. It was the most moving thing I've ever seen: a swan with broken bones and fallen feathers. You just wanted to take in your arms this magical wounded creature. Superb dancing.

Three more remarks about the gala:

(1) A. Oaks and T. Edur did on both nights Impromptu. It was the first time I saw them. Having read in this site many reviews about them, I knew about the classical purity of their line, but I could never imagine the beauty of the dancing. Especially the beauty of her hands. (During the interval I watched them rehearsing. I stood very close to them and I must have been rather disturbing for the dancers, but I couldn't take my eyes of them)

(2) Today I feel bad about what I wrote yesterday about Jennifer Gelfand from Boston. She is not a fine classical dancer, but she has a very strong technique and she does the most spectacular fouettes I‹ve seen, inserting double (or triple?) pirouettes among the fouettes.

(3) Do you know Dmitri Simkin from Wiesbaden Ballet? You should.

Finally:

Since early 1997 I've been visiting this site almost every day and some times I get jealous reading about the performaces you all watch. But if it weren't for Ballet.co, I would never have known all these dancers and it's even possible (with the rather poor publicity for the Gala) that I would not have gone to see them. So, after two years and a half, thank you Bruce.